The cyclone that ripped through southern Africa triggered devastating floods that have killed hundreds of people and displaced hundreds of thousands.
Rescue workers plucked more survivors from trees and roofs to safety on Thursday, a week after a cyclone ripped through southern Africa and triggered devastating floods that have killed hundreds of people and displaced hundreds of thousands.
Correia told a news conference earlier on Wednesday that around 15,000 people, many of them very ill, still need to be rescued."Our biggest fight is against the clock," he said, adding that 3,000 people had been rescued so far. "What struck me first was the number of people on the rooftops and in trees. You could hear communities shouting for help - for hours, for days," said Taylor, who also described meeting people on the badly damaged highways heading towards the devastated areas in search of family members.Even when people are safely out of the floods, the situation is dire.
The cyclone's torrential rains caused the Buzi River and the Pungue River, whose mouths are in the Beira area, to flood their banks. The scale of the flooding is huge - the U.N. satellite agency says floodwaters covered 2,165 square km on March 20. A priority for Thursday was pushing into flooded areas that had not yet been surveyed, said Connor Hartnady, leader of a South African rescue task force.
The WFP stepped up airdrops of high-energy biscuits and water purification tablets to isolated pockets of people stranded by the floodwaters.
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